Cycles and Timers
I love using cycles and timers in my game design. They allow you to do fun things like time based events or day/night cycles. The world comes alive when you build in natural cycles and you can speed them up or slow them down to create neat effects or to change the difficulty of the game.
In Plaguebearer, I used cycles to track the infection rate of citizens in the village. Each cycle would infect a few more people. This put a timer on how long you had to cure people because if it took too long, more would appear. Using a variable for the cycle time allowed me to do dynamic difficulty for the game. Each time you won, the cycle time would get shorter. Each time you lost it would get a bit easier. At some point you hit a quite challenging, but not impossible, cycle of time based on the player's skill at the game.
Cycles in Project Mimir
I'm not doing day/night cycles in Mimir, but I'm thinking in terms of ship cycles. These cycles will be used to set the timing of ship functions, disasters and alien actions. I can quickly adjust (or dynamically as in Plaguebearer) if I want the player to be more hurried or want to give them more time.
One specific use of cycles will be around power. The ship always starts off unpowered and as you bring the power cores online, the power will cycle up. Another use will be to have disasters happen that you will have to manage. Asteroids puncturing the hull of a pod (thus sucking out the O2), fires starting and spreading, electrical components overloading and tripping.
Timers in Mimir
I first noticed action timers in No Man's Sky. I know I've experienced them many times before, but NMS's timers are right there in the middle of the screen - a radial slider that fills as you complete the task. I didn't understand the design behind it at first, but I think it provides a visual that makes you very aware of how long something is taking. You start murmuring at the screen "come on...come on!" as the bar slowly fills up.
I implemented these in Plaugebearer to make it take a certain amount of time to draw blood, create a cure or administer the cure. It's only 5 seconds or so, but it seems to take forever since you know more infected might spawn while you are doing the action. I love that tension.
In Mimir, I'll be using timers similarly to show progress on repairing equipment, welding hulls, rebooting systems, etc. I hope to make the game more exciting and add pressure to the player this way.
In Plaguebearer, I used cycles to track the infection rate of citizens in the village. Each cycle would infect a few more people. This put a timer on how long you had to cure people because if it took too long, more would appear. Using a variable for the cycle time allowed me to do dynamic difficulty for the game. Each time you won, the cycle time would get shorter. Each time you lost it would get a bit easier. At some point you hit a quite challenging, but not impossible, cycle of time based on the player's skill at the game.
Cycles in Project Mimir
I'm not doing day/night cycles in Mimir, but I'm thinking in terms of ship cycles. These cycles will be used to set the timing of ship functions, disasters and alien actions. I can quickly adjust (or dynamically as in Plaguebearer) if I want the player to be more hurried or want to give them more time.
One specific use of cycles will be around power. The ship always starts off unpowered and as you bring the power cores online, the power will cycle up. Another use will be to have disasters happen that you will have to manage. Asteroids puncturing the hull of a pod (thus sucking out the O2), fires starting and spreading, electrical components overloading and tripping.
Timers in Mimir
I first noticed action timers in No Man's Sky. I know I've experienced them many times before, but NMS's timers are right there in the middle of the screen - a radial slider that fills as you complete the task. I didn't understand the design behind it at first, but I think it provides a visual that makes you very aware of how long something is taking. You start murmuring at the screen "come on...come on!" as the bar slowly fills up.
I implemented these in Plaugebearer to make it take a certain amount of time to draw blood, create a cure or administer the cure. It's only 5 seconds or so, but it seems to take forever since you know more infected might spawn while you are doing the action. I love that tension.
In Mimir, I'll be using timers similarly to show progress on repairing equipment, welding hulls, rebooting systems, etc. I hope to make the game more exciting and add pressure to the player this way.
Comments
Post a Comment